Katherine Ryan may be a comedic icon across the pond, but she got her start here in Ontario. With a career that has spanned from BBC presenter to star and creator of Netflix series The Duchess, she’s made a return to her roots as the newest Canada’s Got Talent judge (the finale airs on May 13 on CityTV, where one contestant will walk away with the $1 million prize). She’ll also be stopping in Toronto on May 17 for her comedy tour. Now, the comic gives us the scoop on how she reconnected with her husband, Bobby Kootstra, 20 years after dating in high school.
How they met
Katherine: We met at high school in Sarnia, Ontario, in the 10th grade. I had just gotten my braces off and was in the market for a boyfriend and hopefully some eyebrows. I saw Bobby and decided I was going to marry him.
Bobby: I was recovering from a growth spurt so dramatic that it caused episodes of fainting in class. I was finally a man, and the ladies took notice. Katherine had the best bum in the school.
Katherine: We split up at our senior prom (Bobby’s initiative) and lost touch in university. We reunited randomly 20 years later and decided to have a hilarious one-night stand. Things moved quickly; we were married nine months later.
The relationship
Katherine: I was really hesitant to be in a serious relationship because I had a nice life as a single woman. When Bobby landed in London, he invited me to a private champagne experience on the London Eye, and I declined because it sounded too romantic and I didn’t want to get sucked in. Bobby went alone and shared the ride with some random tourist women. They sent photos, and it didn’t give me FOMO because I truly detest the London Eye.
Bobby: I thought Katherine was playing hard to get, but she really hates the London Eye.
The proposal
Katherine: We didn’t have a romantic proposal. We knew we’d have to get married for immigration reasons if we wanted to stay together so Bobby handled the logistics and scheduled a courthouse ceremony in Denmark, for admin reasons that we won’t bore you with. The weekend before, we were biking around Soho Farmhouse in Oxfordshire, and Bobby pretended to tie his shoe. I got off my bike to see why he had stopped and Bobby stood up with a ring and proposed. We’d already booked the flights so it was more of a gesture than an actual proposal.
The wedding and honeymoon
We got married at a courthouse in Copenhagen at 11 a.m. following a brunch in the hotel with our best friend, who flew in from Finland with her husband to act as a witness. Our daughter Violet was there, and afterwards, we pretty much went straight to the airport and flew back to London.
The kids
We have three kids and would always welcome more! We love making people. Violet (15) is Katherine’s daughter from a previous relationship, and since being married, we have Fred (3) and Fenna Grace (2). Basically, we haven’t slept since we met.
Balancing careers and a relationship
Katherine: I work and Bobby mostly stays home with the kids, but lately he’s been roped into the family reality show, At Home With Katherine Ryan, and is fast emerging as the breakout star for his “fun guy/cool guy” persona. He’s got a dry sense of humour, a bit like Scott Disick on The Kardashians. We manage to make time for our children and our relationship by not having any friends. Our social life is non-existent because we spend all our free time at the soft-play or a trampoline park.
The secret to success
We have a very easy shorthand between us because we grew up in the same small town. We have a special kind of grace for one another because we remember each other as kids. We both believe that nothing in life matters very much, and that very little matters at all. We are first and foremost best friends, and all we really care about is the safety and happiness of our children. Also, we’re rich, which helps.
The future together
We hope to be physically fit enough to enjoy our grandchildren and travel on our own, but we keep having kids in our 40s, so that seems less and less likely as they are sucking the youth out of us at an alarming rate. Our five years of marriage were lockdown and pregnancy years, and we feel two decades older coming out of that. We’ll be lucky to be alive by Christmas. We’ve got life insurance, so we imagine the children together one day, bickering over their inheritance over our lifeless corpses. That’ll be nice.
For the story of how fellow Canada’s Got Talent judge Howie Mandel met his wife, click here.
